The Amateur

Computerist

Winter 2003/04 15 Years of the Amateur Computerist Volume 12 No. 1

Table of Contents

Editorial. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Page 1

Doing Democracy.. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Page 4

Reality Behind E-democracy. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Page 7

OhmyNews.com: A Case Study. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Page 11

2004 U.S. Election. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Page 18

Fifteenth Anniversary of ACN. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Page 22

Letters. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Page 22

Net and the Netizens . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Page 25

Reprints

INTRODUCTION.. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Page 26

Cartoon. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Page 26

DAWN OF A NEW ERA. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Page 27

COMPUTERS & FREE SPEECH.. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Page 28

TRUE HEROS.. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Page 32

Impact of the Computer on Society. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Page 33

The Spirit of Babbage. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Page 35

Interview with Staff Member . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Page 38

Editorial

With this issue of the Amateur Computerist we celebrate 15 years

of publication. Our first issue appeared on February 11, 1988. Though

there were various thoughts of what to name our new newsletter, we

soon arrived at an agreement that the name the “Amateur Computerist”

would be appropriate. Michael, one of our founding editors, had

Webpage: http://www.ais.org/~jrh/acn/

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proposed the name. Floyd Hoke-Miller, who was one of our early

writers, concurred, explaining that “amateur” signified those who do

something for the love of it.

Since that first issue we have maintained our effort to put out a

newsletter for those who do computing, and now online computing, for

the love of it. Though the general tenor of the online world has changed,

since the early 1990's when the Amateur Computerist first got online, the

goal of the newsletter was constant. We had a 10 year reunion meeting

in 1998, at which all the founding editors were present. That gathering

was in Toronto, Canada. At the meeting, Michael proposed that we

seriously consider publishing a book version of the back issues. We did

not find a way to pursue the suggestion and to republish the back issues,

but William Rohler, another of our founding editors has gotten all of our

previous issues into a PDF format and they are now all online at our web

site at: http://www.ais.org/~jrh/ acn/Back_Issues/.

This issue is celebrating 15 years of publication, so we also include

some articles from past issues to give current readers and contributors

a flavor of the earlier years of the Amateur Computerist. We include

“Dawn of a New Era” by Floyd Hoke-Miller. Floyd welcomed the

publication of the newsletter and put it in the context of the pioneering

struggle for an open press, that he had been part of as a contributor to the

early American labor press, and the creation of a local trade union press

in the UAW. The article “The Impact of the Computer on Society: The

Future” describes the social potential that the computer can provide for

society if the goals are kept in mind, “The Spirit of Babbage: Chapter

One” looks back at the early mythological origins of the computer and

gives a fresh perspective for creating this mythology anew. The labor

roots of the newsletter are reflected in the cartoon by Doc Wilson .

There are other articles that describe the commitment to freedom of

speech that is required to support the continued evolution of the

computer and networking, and an article about computer pioneers like

Gary Kindall, the creator of the early operating system CPM, and why

he is the kind of pioneer that need to be remembered and cherished as

those who have made the open and vibrant networking world a reality.

There is also an interview with Staff Member, which looks back at the

roots of interactive computer development and the hobbyist movement

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that spawned the BBS developments and the sharing tradition it was part

of. The second part of the interview looks back at the introduction of

computers onto the shop floor in a factory and the kind of challenges

that presents.

Along with these reflections from the past, we have included

articles on the potential for a more participatory democracy that the

Internet provides. The article “Doing Democracy” was written to

celebrate the 10 year anniversary of the first posting online of “The Net

and Netizens.” The article is reprinted from its publication in German

and English in the German online Journal Telepolis. Another reprint

from Telepolis, is John Horvath’s article “The Reality Behind E-

democracy” examining how hard is the challenge to actually achieve a

democratic form of democracy, and what are some of the obstacles to be

overcome. The article by K. Jean Min, “OhmyNews.com: A Case

Study,” describes how a participatory form of journalism was created in

South Korea and how the netizens movement there was able to challenge

the conservative press and achieve some victories over it. A president

for the country who was not part of the conservative power structure was

elected as a result.

We want to thank our readers, subscribers, contributors and all who

have helped to make the Amateur Computerist possible through these 15

years. Most especially I want to thank the editors. William Rohler,

Norman Thompson, and Jay Hauben have worked hard to keep the

Amateur Computerist publishing and developing. Sadly one of our

founding editors, Michael Hauben, is not able to share this 15 year

anniversary with us. We will strive to carry on the tradition of the

netizen that he helped to bring into the world.

We welcome comments on this and other past issues, contributions

from readers, and support toward continuing to publish the Amateur

Computerist long into the future so that there will be a journal for those

who do computing and online networking for the love of it.

Ronda Hauben

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Doing Democracy

by Ronda Hauben

[email protected]

Reflections on the 10 year Anniversary of the Publica-

tion of “The Net and Netizens”

This is a period marked by serious political dissatisfaction around

the world. There is the promise of democratic societies, but the promise

too often is far removed from the reality of people’s lives. Yet there is

the widespread yearning for a better world, for a society where democ-

racy is practiced, not merely pretended. In this situation the question is

raised: “What does democracy look like? How does it function? Are

there any operational models to observe and learn from?”

Fortunately, there is a model to be examined, a practice to be

investigated. Ten years ago, on July 6, 1993, a student, [Michael

Hauben

], posted a paper on the Net. The title of the paper was

“Common Sense: The Net and Netizens.” The paper begins:

“Welcome to the 21

Century. You are a Netizen (Net Citizen), and

you exist as a citizen of the world thanks to the global connectivity that

the Net gives you. You consider everyone as your compatriot. You

physically live in one country but you are in contact with much of the

world via the global computer network. Virtually you live next door to

every other single netizen in the world. Geographical separation is

replaced by existence in the same virtual space.”

It was a long paper so it was posted in three separate parts: Preface

Paper

, Appendix.

The paper introduced a concept, which has since spread around the

world, both online and off (see also Netizens: On the History and Impact

of Usenet and the Internet

). This concept can provide a practical

operational framework to explore a model for democracy.

Describing how he hoped to focus the paper, the student wrote:

“The Net and Netizens: A Revitalization of People Power, a Strengthen-

ing of People Power. Bottom Up is the Principle of this paper.”

The interesting aspect of “The Net and Netizens” is that it identifies

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and describes the important role of the online user in creating the new

social treasure that had come to be known as the Net. The net.citizen, or

netizen, as the student wrote, was the active agent in creating something

new, the democratic online content and form of the 1993 network of

networks. The netizen contributed information and viewpoints that made

it possible to consider an issue or problem and come to a reasoned

judgment or decision. Netizens would help other netizens if they deemed

it worthwhile.

The initiative that was being developed was from the netizens

themselves. Examples included a mailing list by a person in Ireland

summarizing the weekly news and sending it out to over 1000 people

around the world who wanted to stay current with Irish news; Usenet

newsgroups like misc.news.southasia and soc.culture.india which made

it possible for people from an area to continue contact with what was

happening; a mailing list to watch the prices of gas in California to warn

against price gouging. There were many other examples that the student

provided which he had learned from his research online.

The key aspect, however, of this new form of democracy, was that

the previously disenfranchised reader could now broadcast to others

around the world, news and views from a grassroots perspective.

Previously, there had been central control of the mass media. Now the

participant himself or herself, could provide information to the online

world about an event or an area of knowledge. Netizens also had the

ability to be citizen reporters, to offer a more wide ranging set of

viewpoints and perspectives on issues or problems, a broader basis from

which to form one’s own opinion, than hitherto had been possible.

Netizens could meet online, discuss issues and problems, and from

the process decide on the goal or direction to pursue. The student saw

this process as a way of revitalizing society, as a way that those

previously disenfranchised could gain power over both their society and

over their personal lives.

In this operating model of democracy, there were no elections or

representatives. Rather this embryo of democracy was focused on the

active participation and contributions of the many in a manner not

hitherto possible. The student described some of the broad ranging ages

and occupations of the more than 10 million computer users who, by

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1993, were connected around the world. At the time the computer

networking connections were made possible by gateways between

different networks, like the scientific and educational Internet, the

academic Bitnet, the technical research Unix UUCP and Usenet net-

work, the Cleveland Freenet for community people, and other networks.

While the netizen was an active contributor to the developing social

treasure, the student realized the need to make it possible for everyone

to have access to this new communication paradigm to realize its

potential. He writes:

“This complete connection of the body of citizens of the world does

not exist as of today, and it will definitely be a fight to make access to

the Net open and available to all. However, in the future we might be

seeing the possible expansion of what it means to be a social animal.

Practically every single individual on the Net today is available to every

other person on the Net.... International connection coexists on the same

level with local connection. Also the computer networks allow a more

advanced connection between the people who are communicating.”

Although the path was difficult, the student also appreciated the

importance of the goal. He writes:

“Despite the problems, for people of the world, the Net provides a

powerful way of peaceful assembly. Peaceful Assembly allows for

people to take control over their lives, rather than control being in the

hands of others. This power has to be honored and protected. Any

medium or tool that helps people to hold or gain power is something

special and has to be protected.”

The focus of democracy, as described in “The Net and Netizens,”

is on the people themselves, and on their ability and achievements in

determining the nature and development of their society. It is on support

for the ever increasing contributions of more of the populace in the

process.

Links

http://www.columbia.edu/~hauben/netbook/

2. http://www.columbia.edu/~hauben/CS/Common_Sense1.txt

http://www.columbia.edu/~hauben/CS/Common_Sense2.txt

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4. http://www.columbia.edu/~hauben/CS/Common_Sense3.txt

http://www.firstmonday.dk/issues/issue3_7/introduction/

A version of this article appeared on TELEPOLIS and can be seen at:

http://www.heise.de/tp/english/inhalt/te/15166/1.html

The Reality Behind E-democracy

by John Horvath

[email protected]

The dream of e-democracy lives on, despite the fact that it belongs

in the realm of virtual reality.

Looking back, the late 1990s expectations of a “paradigm shift” to

an Internet-driven “new economy” was naively over-optimistic. The

economy as a whole wasn’t altered as fundamentally as some had hoped

(or feared). Likewise, other utopian views of our digital future have

failed to materialize. This includes notions of a new form of governance,

commonly referred to as “e-democracy.”

Yet a growing number of people continue to view modern commu-

nications technologies, such as the Internet and e-mail, as a way to

bridge the gap between citizen and government. E-democracy is still

seen as a way to breathe new life into democratic systems of govern-

ment. The interest in a “digital democracy” is in part due to the fact that

participation in traditional democratic forums has hit new lows in the

west. The explanations for this apparent drift towards apathy are

manifold, as are the proposals for addressing it.

Without doubt, these are tough times for democracies in the western

world. At every level of government voter turnout is low and, in many

cases, steadily falling. Many citizens feel government is becoming

increasingly remote. There is little transparency and there is corruption

at all levels – economic, moral, and ideological – rendering most

democratic systems as nothing more than a contest between tweedle-

dees and tweedle-dums.

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“From an intermittent democracy regulated by elections to a

continuous democracy”

Nevertheless, European Union leaders still consider the notion of

e-democracy as something worth pursuing – and promoting. In a recent

special issue of The IPTS Report

put out this past summer by the

Seville-based Institute for Prospective Technological Studies, govern-

ment officials at local, national and European levels, as well as

broadcasters, academics and IT specialists, attempted to identify the

opportunities and pitfalls on the road toward a digital democracy.

Several of the authors noted that the Internet, by breaking down

traditional barriers to communication, may provide a prime opportunity

to revolutionise the mechanics of democracy. “The internet has created

radical new possibilities to reinvigorate and enrich democratic dia-

logue,” stated Greek Foreign Minister George Papandreou in the

editorial.

The feeling of those who continue to harbour pleasant dreams about

a digital democracy is that the Internet could pave the way for a more

participative, or direct, democracy. “We are moving from an intermittent

democracy regulated by elections to a continuous democracy,” explained

Andre Santini, the mayor of Issy-les-Moulineaux, a Paris suburb that has

carried out several experiments in e-government. Just as some ancient

Greek city-states were role models for our modern democracies, Mr

Santini says that modern cities are spearheading the drive towards

electronic governance. “Local government has experienced a real revival

through the introduction of information and communication technolo-

gies,” he says.

According to The IPTS Report, digital democracy has made some

remarkable advances and provides a number of examples of successful

experiments. These include the world’s first global online poll which

was set up to coincide with the Earth Summit in Johannesburg, Internet

games to promote participation among young people, as well as citizen’s

forums and e-voting in local elections. One notable example at the EU

level was the recent launch of the “e-Vote” project. As the report

explains, tens of thousands of European citizens have already voted on

numerous topical issues, with more than 100,000 expressing opinions on

the Iraq crisis alone.

Page 8

One major hurdle for proponents of digital democracy, however, is

the enigma of the “digital divide.” Democracy is by definition inclusive,

so the current level of Internet exclusion is a fundamental constraint on

the spread of e-democracy. In fact, new research shows evidence of this

digital divide growing in Europe. The study,

compiled by Forrester

Research, suggests that by 2008, the proportion of homes with high

speed Internet access in Europe could vary from 5 per cent in Greece to

45 per cent in Norway.

The study concludes that broadband in Europe will be unevenly

split along a clear north/south divide. Scandinavia and the Netherlands

will dominate the ratings; German-speaking Europe, Belgium, Finland,

and the U.K. will form a second tier; and Southern Europe and Ireland

will continue to lag. Overall, by 2008 Forrester predicts that only 30 per

cent of all homes in Europe will have broadband.

Realizing the extent of this gap, some have suggested that if the EU

and its Member States regard electronic participation seriously, they

must then ensure universal access to the technology. “As we move

towards a written EU constitution, we must ensure that the Internet [...]

is in both its heart and mind,” says Derek Wyatt, member of the U.K.

parliament. Wyatt urges governments to view the Internet in the same

way as gas and electricity, as a public utility for all.

This, in itself, is a problem of sorts: if Internet access is to be

regarded as a public utility like electricity, does this mean the more

money you have the more you are able to exercise your democratic

rights and responsibilities? And what happens when the lights go out, as

in the U.S., the U.K., and more recently all of Italy? Are your demo-

cratic rights then suspended or at least put on hold until the power comes

back on? No doubt, this would give extra meaning to Bertrand Russell’s

saying that we have our freedom until we need it the most.

Waving the wand of electronic wizardry will not magically boost

democratic participation.

Along these lines, some have been careful to warn that simply

waving the wand of electronic wizardry will not magically boost

democratic participation. “The process of widening involvement [...]

will be harder than just creating the opportunity to participate,” cautions

Greg Dyke, Director-General of the BBC. “E-democracy requires not

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just technical development but deep cultural change where the ‘citizen

consumer’ is given a recognised role in the political process.” Mr Dyke

suggests that public television can provide an instructive model for

greater citizen involvement and a crucial link between government and

society. “The BBC and other European public service broadcasters may

be better placed than almost any other organizations to provide a starting

point to encourage the widest range of people to participate in civic life.”

At the end of the day, what is missed by many when considering the

question of digital democracy is not just issues of technology or access.

“Digital literacy” is also important. Many who use the Internet today

don’t exploit it to its full potential; they are trapped within the narrow

confines of basic and routine tasks. Most wouldn’t know how to find

information which exist outside the range of Google, Yahoo, or MSN,

for instance.

Moreover, democracy is not simply the act of voting but also of

taking a measure of interest and responsibility for actions which may

affect society as a whole. While some mention activities such as

communicating with elected representatives as a step forward for the

concept of digital democracy, computer-mediated communications in

this case can be a curse as well as a blessing. True, it makes it easier to

make contact, but automation processes also enable elected representa-

tives to hide behind their virtual identities, sometimes avoiding the

public altogether. As that old adage from the late 1990s goes, “no-one

knows if you’re a dog on-line.”

But even more important than this is the realization that most

politicians and policymakers who talk about e-government are not really

interested in democracy at all. The proof is in the pudding, as can be

seen in anti-globalization protests in Europe and abroad. When real

democratic participation is attempted by citizens at large, leaders hide

behind high fences and far away in remote locations, surrounded by

successive rings of security. For digital democracy to succeed in reality,

off-line democracy must first exist in practice.

Page 10

Notes:

1. The IPTS Report. Special issue on e-democracy, Number 75, European Commission,

Joint Research Centre, June 2003,

http://www.jrc.es/iptsreport

2. http://dbs.cordi s.lu/cordis-cgi/srchidadb?ACTION=D&SESSION=

129102003-10-8&DOC=2&TBL=EN_NEWS&RCN=EN_RCN_ID:20704&

CALLER=EN_UNIFIEDSRCH

This article originally appeared on Telepolis:

http://www.telepolis.de/english/inhalt/te/15807/1.html

OhmyNews.com: A Case Study

by K. Jean Min

[email protected]

[Editors Note: This case study was written before Roh Moo-hyun won

the presidential election in South Korea in November 2003. The critical

factor in his winning the presidency was the support and active

participation of the South Korean netizens movement. OhmyNews is

reported to have played a significant role in that movement.]

“The Net is vast and infinite,” mulls a cyborg agent, Kusanagi, in

a cyberpunk anime Ghost in the Shell before she jumps into the Net with

her newfound body.

Oh Yeon-ho also dreamed of jumping into the Net someday with a

slightly different idea; recruit a corps of young cyber reporters from the

vast and infinite Net. For his master’s degree in mass-communication

during his stay in United States, he wrote a paper on the start-up of a

news media business. He aspired to publish a news media powerful

enough to compete with major newspapers or broadcasting stations in

terms of agenda-setting power. But doing so required a huge sum of

capital investment and hundreds of seasoned professional reporters.

With the meager money he raised from his pocket and that of a couple

of other investors, he realized the only answer lay in the Internet.

So was launched OhmyNews.com, the first Korean vernacular

Internet news service made purely by Netizens. Within just two years it

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has earned a rock-solid reputation as one of the most influential Internet

news sites among Korean netizens. Last year it was ranked as 8th

influential news media in Korea by the annual Sisa Journal survey, a

fast and unprecedented success in the fierce Korean news business.

Currently it is enticing more than a million visitors everyday, an all time

high number throughout its short life.

Company Overview

Turn-Off

How did it grow so fast? First of all, venturing into a news business,

especially print news requires a huge initial investment. You have to

build a massive printing plant, hire at least a couple of hundred reporters

and establish a national distribution network in a single month or two.

Even if you execute this daunting job quickly and flawlessly, there is no

guarantee of success whatsoever. This is because such powerful media

giants as Chosun Ilbo, Joongang Ilbo and Dong-A Ilbo already dominate

the Korean news market with their combined market share hovering

around a whopping 70%. Moreover they wield exclusive power over

their critical national distribution network.

It is virtually impossible to penetrate into the news market to say

nothing of surviving as a major player even if you possess unlimited

resources. In other words, the Korean print news market was heavily

fortified to protect the dominance of the incumbent players.

The clear evidence is Hyundai’s failed endeavor. Hyundai group

-Founded; February 22nd. 2000

-Initial capital; KRW 200M won ($170,000)

-Product/Service: On-line daily news provider

-Major income source: banner advertising

(70%), journalism school (20%), news

contents sale (10%), OhmyNews 2002

(Weekly News magazine), classified ads

-Market value: not listed yet

-Competition: no serious contenders in general

on-line daily news category except Pressian

Page 12

founder Chung Ju Young tried to set his foot into the news business by

introducing Munhwa Ilbo with a hidden aim of using it as a political

leverage during the upcoming presidential election in 1992. Neither he

nor his beloved Munhwa Ilbo succeeded in this bold endeavor though he

poured hundreds of billions of wons until he finally sold his stake in the

paper. Munhwa Ilbo was ranked way below OhmyNews in the same

survey conducted by Sisa Journal last year.

Turn-On

OhmyNews learned a lot from the fate of Munhwa Ilbo. It realized

that venturing into the newspaper market was an insane idea and decided

to create a daily news media existing and operating only in cyberspace.

That way it could save tons of money which otherwise it had to provide

by borrowing or fund-raising.

Secondly it opened its news gathering web server to all Netizens.

Anyone who has something to tell or bits of news – whom it calls News

Guerillas – can log on to the OhmyNews server, type in his or her story

and upload related pictures. Dedicated editors in OhmyNews scan them

and evaluate quality and validity of each article a netizen has reported

and select ones that satisfy the preset guideline. Each netizen reporter

will be rewarded with cyber cash depending on the number and

importance of selected articles. That way OhmyNews could produce

enough news content without hiring a bunch of dedicated reporters.

The validity of such a radical idea had already been proven.

Countless numbers of cyber writers were flexing their editorial muscle

on various web-logs, bulletin boards or their own homepages.

OhmyNews was confident that a lot of talented writers are out there

starving for public recognition. That is exactly what OhmyNews

provided; public cyberspace where an amateur cyber writer can express

his or her writing skill in the eyes of hundreds of thousands of netizens

with some cash rewards as a bonus.

The cash reward per each article offered by the editing desk is a

meager amount. Depending on the level of news space hierarchy that

each article had occupied, the cyber reporter was paid one thousand, five

thousand or ten thousand won respectively (from $.85 to $8.50).

Nonetheless, cyber reporters or columnists did not care much about the

Page 13

money. After all, they were rewarded already when their editorials,

columns or reports were given a little shaft of floodlight.

Since the news space of OhmyNews was professionally presented

in terms of the look and feel and design esthetics compared with other

amateur web-logs, cyber writers were generally more satisfied than

elsewhere. OhmyNews started with 700 plus news guerillas when it was

launched back in Feb. 2000 but quickly gained thousands of new

guerillas month after month until it reached over 18,000 as of May 2002.

On the other hand, as the futurist Alvin Tofler once predicted in his

book Future Shock, these netizen reporters could be deemed as true

‘prosumers’ in that they participate in the production of news stories that

they would consume themselves. This strategy again reinforced readers’

loyalty to OhmyNews since it assured them that their voice was heard.

Demographics of News Guerillas

(As of Nov. 2001)

Sex Number %

Male 11189 74.40%

Female 3838 25.60%

Age Number %

10~19 1593 10.60%

20~29 6782 45.10%

30~39 4872 32.40%

40~49 1454 9.70%

50~59 258 1.70%

60~70 56 0.40%

70~79 17 0.10%

Occupation Number %

Undergraduates 3515 23.40%

Others 2408 16.00%

White Collar 2276 15.10%

Journalist 1391 9.30%

Small Business 750 5.00%

Page 14

Self employed 720 4.80%

High school student 696 4.60%

Graduates 582 3.90%

IT 564 3.80%

Middle school student 527 3.50%

Teachers 481 3.20%

Public servant 375 2.50%

Arts 234 1.60%

Homemaker 199 1.30%

Medical 124 0.80%

Armed force 106 0.70%

Farmer 60 0.40%

Legal 24 0.20%

Lastly, it redefined the scope of news itself. OhmyNews shattered

conventional wisdom that only stories about the who’s who in politics,

economy and cultural arena can merit being treated as “news.” Why

should ordinary people be fed with tons of irrelevant news they have no

use for?, it asked. This Copernican about-face on the concept of the

news came as a shock to the majority of Korean netizens. Since the

majority of news consumers were deeply dissatisfied with the autocratic

voice and arbitrary editorials of the Big Three newspapers, this

iconoclastic approach to news created a stir among young readers.

Take off

As OhmyNews gained attention and became the talk of the town, the

number of newly joining news guerillas as well as daily visitors began

to explode. To make these first-time visitors come again, and hence

retain them as permanent readers, OhmyNews devised from its inception

another hook named Readers’ Voice.

Readers’ Voice worked this way. Each visitor can jot down his or

her comment below each article. If he likes a certain article, he can show

his preference by clicking into an accompanying banner. The first

attempt of this kind in the news business. Each click translates into 50

won (4.25 cents) additional reward for the netizen reporters. To earn as

much money as possible netizen reporters should do their best to

Page 15

produce quality news. And some readers would visit OhmyNews with a

single purpose of enjoying readers’ comments.

Often, Readers’ Voice quickly escalated into the de facto Readers’

Forum as readers chatted and fought among themselves. Some hotly

debated topics would casually draw more than a thousand reader

comments, a phenomenal number for a fledgling Internet news media.

That gave another boost for its page view performance. Readers’ Voice

became so popular among netizens that even OhmyNews’ powerful

archrival Chosun Ilbo decided to adopt this service into Dizzo, its

Internet equivalent. Readers’ Voice proved an ultimate device to exploit

the interactivity of the Internet.

All these efforts combined with occasional scoops brought

handsome rewards to OhmyNews. Visitors and page views of the site

literally exploded. They marveled at 100,000 plus daily visitors during

the first year when OhmyNews reported a comical sit-down demonstra-

tion of former president Kim Young Sam for 24 hours. This incident

epitomized the potential of the Internet as the most favored news media

to deliver “history as it happens.”

Soon this record was broken when OhmyNews reported the fuss

over the U.S. Presidential Election in late 2000. Record after record was

broken to create new heights of daily visitors statistics.

Live cast of the historic event as it actually happened glued the

readers to the site creating a powerful stickiness factor. There was an

increasing pattern of daily visitors as well as website ranking since its

foundation in Feb. 2000 up until May 2000.

As time went by, the news content by news guerillas was stacked up

to produce a huge amount. OhmyNews published several books

containing ordinary stories by ordinary news guerillas. Some prominent

news guerillas were even approached by a publishing agency for

possible publication of their columns or articles that appeared on the

news site. The increasing off-line presence of OhmyNews boosted

on-line power again making it the 10

and 8

most influential news

media in Korea in 2000 and 2001 respectively in a survey conducted by

Sisa Journal.

Using the ever-increasing number of visitors and its influence as

leverage, OhmyNews intensified sales of its ad space and also sold its

Page 16

news content to DAUM, the largest Korean portal site. Its major revenue

source was comprised of ad sales (70%), journalism school (20%) and

news content sales (10%) as of 2001.

Live web casting from the Ruling Party Presidential Caucus

However, as is the case with other Internet ventures in Korea, the

phenomenal success of OhmyNews would have been impossible without

the world’s highest level of broadband penetration in Korea. The rapidly

expanding number of broadband subscribers provided OhmyNews

another jumping off point. It realized video and audio rich content could

be easily carried to netizens’ PCs via this fat pipe.

In early March 2002, OhmyNews experimented with live web

casting by airing real time pictures from the ruling party’s caucus in

Kwangjoo to elect a presidential candidate. It turned out to be a huge

success. The OhmyNews server counted over three million unique page

views in a single day, another record to be broken to reach five and six

million figure each new month.

With the full swing broadband environment firmly in place,

OhmyNews could become anything, be it a daily newspaper, occasional

broadcasting station or live web radio. By that time the dedicated

reporters in OhmyNews began to call themselves a multimedia news

agency.

Transformation

As a progressive and politics-oriented news media as OhmyNews is,

it has a certain limit in terms of expanding its readership potential

significantly. Establishing itself as a firm news media without losing the

allure of an iconoclastic underdog is a tricky game. OhmyNews will lose

its loyal readers once it tries to satisfy as many politically varied

segments at once as possible. We would rather recommend it to expand

the scope of its news stories significantly without deviating from its

progressive and center-left biased political color.

Publishing OhmyNews 2002, a weekly off-line equivalent of

OhmyNews also helped. Off-line readers clicked into the on-line

OhmyNews and vice versa. That way it could expand its readership

foundation significantly creating on-off synergy. Focusing on covering

Page 17

the presidential election campaign might also help this year. The lion’s

share of its readership comes from the age group ranging from late

twenties to early thirties, the most politically dynamic demographic

segment in Korea.

If it maintains this strategy we believe it can certainly jack up its

ranking significantly as the most influential news media in Korea. Let’s

wait and see this November, when Sisa Journal conducts its annual

survey named ‘Korea’s most admired and influential News media’.

Summary & Lessons:

* Netizens want their voices to be heard; they are prosumers instead of

passive consumers.

* OhmyNews made the most out of existing Internet infrastructure

eliminating the need of a huge capital investment.

* Find a way to translate huge viewership into a profit machine: banner

advertising, classified ads, news contents sale, off-line publishing and

shopping mall for readers.

* Differentiate your image to establish political identity then stick to

yourself to maintain a lasting brand entity

Will the Internet and Netizens

Impact the 2004 U.S.

Presidential Election?

by Ronda Hauben

For a while Howard Dean’s campaign for the Democratic Party

nomination in the U.S. seemed to startle political observers.

His use of

the Internet and his volunteer campaign staff of netizens were succeed-

ing in unexpected ways to change campaigning procedures and

practices. Many of his volunteers have been recruited via the Meetup.org

online web site, and his campaign staff sponsors a “Deanblog for

America” web site that allows readers to comment on his campaign

Page 18

articles.

There are other web sites like blogforamerica.com which

provide both articles from the Dean campaign and comments by

supporters.

Dean’s campaign also surprised other contenders for the

nomination by raising significant campaign funds online.

As the campaign for the Iowa caucus votes and then the New

Hampshire primary gathered steam, the news media in the U.S. is

focusing less on the potential of the Internet to help candidates gain the

Democratic Party nomination. Instead the conservative media organiza-

tions are encouraging the old means of campaigning that has led the

Democratic Party to become increasingly harder to distinguish from the

Republican Party. Negative or positive campaign ads on television,

leaflets in mailboxes, newspaper and television editorials, and televised

debates are forms of campaigning that bring the old guard of the major

political parties back on the political stage they have dominated for so

long. This is the kind of politics that led to the situation in the 2000

Presidential election where the distinction between the major party

candidates was so slim that the Supreme Court was allowed to decide

the election.

Can the Internet help overcome the barriers to defeating an

incumbent in the 2004 U.S. Presidential election? Observers of the role

played in the South Korean Presidential election by netizens and the

Internet are wondering if the success of their efforts are a phenomena

that can be repeated in the upcoming U.S. Presidential election. In 2002,

a South Korean netizens movement was able to effectively challenge the

political old guard by waging an Internet campaign first to nominate and

then elect Roh Moo-hyun as the South Korean President.

Netizens

challenged the previous forms of campaign strategy. Critical to the

success of the South Korean netizens was an online press that welcomed

discussion of its articles by online users. Even more important, however,

was the way it promoted the practice of “Every citizen a reporter.”

The

most notable of these is the media organization OhmyNews. This

organization started online in February, 2000 with little money and four

full time reporters. The publisher, Yeon-ho Oh welcomed articles from

volunteer reporters he called “citizen reporters”. The online newspaper

soon had contributions from 737 citizen reporters and the interest of a

growing number of readers. By September 2003, the number of

Page 19

professional journalists working for OhmyNews had climbed to 53, and

there were 26,700 citizen reporters contributing articles. Citizen

reporters are paid a small fee for their articles. They contribute their

articles to make OhmyNews a force to challenge the conservative news

organizations that had previously monopolized Korean politics.

There is not a similar kind of news media organization in the U.S.,

though the different Democratic candidate campaigns, especially the

Dean campaign, are using webblogs to promote communication among

their supporters.

A recent event in China, however, demonstrates the power of

participation online. Recently the Chinese online press described the

death of a Chinese peasant and the injury of several others in Harbin, the

capital of the Heilongjiang Province in Northeast China. The woman,

Liu Zhongxia, was killed after a BMW driven by Su Xiuwen hit her. The

BMW had had its rearview mirror slightly damaged after Liu’s husband

Dai Yiquan, who was driving a tractor, swerved slightly to avoid hitting

a vehicle that was coming into him on the narrow road.

The driver of the BMW got out of her car and reportedly threatened

Dia and his wife. Then Su got back into her BMW, and instead of

backing away from the accident, drove the car forward killing Liu and

injuring several of the bystanders. The case went to court and the BMW

driver was given a suspended sentence. The fact that none of those

injured, or who had been bystanders testified at the trial, however, was

part of the troubling circumstances that led to a public outcry over the

events of this case. Dai and the others injured received cash settlements

from the BMW driver’s husband. In exchange, they agreed not to speak

about the case.

Chinese netizens learned of the case, and the court verdict and

began posting to Internet forums. Soon there were 70,000 comments on

the news web site Sina.com, a famous Chinese web portal.

By the

second week in January, 2004, the Washington Post reports that there

had been over 310,000 messages posted at the Sina portal, when the

Chinese government had the site delete 20% of the messages as being

too critical of the government. By Thursday, January 15, 2004, the

250,000 messages that remained were deleted as well.

By this time, the

case had achieved international attention. It had become a symbol of the

Page 20

growing gap between rich and poor in China and of the frustration

among the Chinese population with the corruption in government

accompanying the government’s pro business policy.

Even in a country censoring Internet use, like China, netizens have

demonstrated the power that online discussion forums can provide for

the grassroots. Those discussing the BMW incident online, have been

able to bring the case to the attention of the national and international

media and are seeking to have the case retried. Can the Dean campaign

or the campaigns of other democratic candidates vying for the nomina-

tion tap this power of the Internet and of netizens to achieve what seems

unachievable? An online press welcoming and encouraging citizen

contributions of articles and discussion of those articles would help. In

China, netizens are finding ways to counter the censorship of online

discussion. In South Korea, netizens were able to create a vibrant online

netizens movement to elect the candidate they supported to the South

Korean Presidency. The upcoming election in the U.S. is a challenge to

U.S. netizens to learn from the experience of others around the world

and in the U.S. to be able to tap the power of the Internet to make a

significant impact on the 2004 Presidential election.

Notes

http://www.heise.de/tp/deutsch/inhalt/co/16503/1.html

http://www.deanforamerica.com/

3. http://www.blogforamerica.com/

http://www.seoprise.com/technote/read.cgi?board=min&y_number=106&nnew=2

5. http://www.japanmediareview.com/japan/internet/1063672919p.php

http://www1.chinadaily.com.cn/en/doc/2004-01/18/content_300105.htm

7. http://bbs.chinadaily.com.cn/forumpost.shtml?toppid=39672

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A21197-2004Jan15.html

9. http://www.columbia.edu/~hauben/netizens2004.txt

This article appeared on Telepolis and can be seen at:

http://www.heise.de/tp/english/inhalt/te/16613/1.html. It also appeared

in Korean and English on OhmyNews at:

http://www.ohmynews.com/articleview/article_view.asp?menu=c104

00&no=148854&rel_no=1&adcheck=1&index=1

Page 21

Fifteenth Anniversary of the

Amateur Computerist

Two thousand and three marked the 15

year of publication of the

Amateur Computerist newsletter. To commemorate those 15 years the

staff held a reunion. We reprint in this issue three letters connected with

the reunion and eight articles reprinted from our earlier issues. Back

issues from all 15 years are online in PDF format at http://www .ais.org

/~jrh/acn/Back_Issues.

Letter from the Amateur Computerist

Date: Tue, 29 Jul 2003 22:18:17 -0400 (EDT)

From: Jay Hauben

Subject: Amateur Computerist 15

Anniversary

Dear Friend,

Begun in 1988, 2003 marks the 15

Anniversary of the Amateur

Computerist.

For these 15 years the Amateur Computerist has championed love

of computing, universal access, netizenship, defense of the net as a

public domain and progress toward participatory democracy on and off

the net.

Sending out the Amateur Computerist for 15 years we have

occasionally received comments, suggestions and criticisms from our

readers. These are always welcomed and helpful in our work.

We would be especially happy to receive comments and greetings

via e-mail from any and all of our readers on this occasion.

In 1988 when we edited our first issue the whole staff lived in the

Detroit area. Since 1994 we have edited our issues using the Internet

because we no longer live close enough to meet in person. We did have

a reunion in 1998 to mark the tenth anniversary. This weekend August

Page 22

1-4 we will again have a reunion. This time to mark the 15

anniversary

of our publication.

The reunion will be in the Harrisburg region of Pennsylvania in the

USA. If any of our readers in that region would like to greet us in

person, please send me e-mail and I will try to make arrangements. I will

be reading my e-mail until Friday morning August 1.

Take care.

For the Amateur Computerist,

Jay Hauben

Letter from Germany

Date: Mon, 28 Jul 2003 09:44:10 +0200

From: Ronald J. Bartle <[email protected]>

Subject: AW: 15 year anniversary

To the Staff of the Amateur Computerist on the Occasion of the 15

Anniversary.

Hi to you folks. I am a British (Royal) Air Force war disabled

veteran who has, generally speaking, been through a bit in life and as a

result have some opinions and views that I had for many years not found

much opportunity to express. Not many of us are blessed with the

ownership of a newspaper-publishing house or have the wherewithal to

set up a TV Station. On the other hand many of us have quite legitimate

reasons to feel strongly about this or that matter of concern on the

political front and are keen to see a bit more real democracy practiced.

In the early 80's I was encouraging discussion by distributing progres-

sive literature on the Streets of SW London and backing this up by

regular debates via CB Radio. Then – as if destiny had seen the

frustrations of folks such as myself – along came the Internet. Not

surprisingly – with my background in military and other professional

communications – I personally found it not too hard to get online and

became one of the early subscribers to the Amateur Computerist. One

Page 23

had become well aware of the potential for real advancement in the lot

of mankind that the net _could_ mean if it was maintained, preserved

and defended as a modern-day Forum in the old democratic Tradition of

Greece and Rome.

Not only because of climate – many of our modern industrial-nation

cities do not really offer much of a physical forum where the citizens can

sit around and discuss the affairs of the day and formulate a common

position, which would then come to the notice of the ruling classes. If

there is a widely accessible Forum today – it would tend to be on-line

and still needs to be made more accessible to a broader proportion of the

general public globally. As you will be well aware – it is just such

considerations as these that the Amateur Computerist has been pursuing

and upholding down the years and one can only hope that the readership

will extend and that its influence will expand. I congratulate you folks

on your faithful support for this important project down the years and

trust you will find fulfilment and occasionally even some fun while

continuing to do so.

Ronald J. Bartle

(Computer and Internet Consultant to the German Federal Association

of Psychiatric Survivors – www .bpe-online.de)

Letter from Australia

Date: Tue, 12 Aug 2003 15:11:27 +1000

From: Geiselhart, Karin

Subject: 15th anniversary

Dear Jay and Ronda,

Sorry I could not be with you for the anniversary of the Amateur

Computerist. My thoughts were with you, and I hope it was a great

pleasure for all concerned....

My latest work project (local broadband content) is at

http://creativecanberra.net. My contract here finishes mid-September,

Page 24

then I might continue the project with community groups.

Much love,

Karin

Net and the Netizens Commemorated

[Editors Note: To mark the 10

anniversary of publication online of the

seminal article the Net and Netizens, Pier Luigi Capucci, Director of

Noema, in Italy and his students reformatted the article and put it on

their web site. The following is Capucci’s Introduction to the article at:

http://www.noemalab.com/sections/specials/netizen/main.html]

This is a draft, originally in text format, which led to the book

Netizens: On the History and Impact of Usenet and the Internet, by

Michael and Ronda Hauben, published by the IEEE Computer Society

in 1997 and which also appears in an online edition. “Netizen” is today

a common and widespread term. We can find it on many occasions,

debates, articles, essays, art exhibits, political acts (like the Netizens

Protection Act introduced by the U.S. Congress against online

spamming in 1997)... search engines can show about 100.000 instances

of this word. The “Netizen” concept involves a new and extended vision

of our society, which we are hardly shaping and redefining with many

social, ethical, political, cultural issues to be aware of.

Michael Hauben, who coined the term “Netizen” and gave it a

meaning, posting his research on Usenet just ten years ago, died

suddenly in New York on June 27, 2001, at 28. His research, starting

from the origins and development of Usenet to the diffusion of the Net

(he participated in online communities since the early 1980s), is

fundamental for understanding the current information society, from

sharing information to online communication and participation, from the

rising and diffusion of the Internet communities to the net policies. He

is one of the pioneers who can envisage the future and help us to find the

way. With Michael we believe in a vision of the online world as a

Page 25

powerful and positive place.

We greatly thank Ronda Hauben for the permission to republish this

draft and the help in this Noema issue on the Netizen idea.

Pier Luigi Capucci, Noema director

[In honor of 15 years of the publication of the Amateur Computerist we

are reprinting some articles from our early issues. The following is

reprinted from the Volume 1 number 1 issue of the Amateur

Computerist.]

Introduction

This newsletter is to inform people of developments in an effort to

advance computer education. Workers at the Ford Rouge Plant in

Dearborn, MI. were denied computer programming classes. There was

an effort by administrators of the UAW-Ford program at the Dearborn

Engine Plant to kill interest in computers and computer programming.

We want to keep interest alive because computers are the future. We

Page 26

want to disperse information to users about computers. Since the

computer is still in the early stage of development, the ideas and

experiences of the users need to be shared and built on if this technology

is to advance. To this end, this newsletter is dedicated to all people

interested in learning about computers. We welcome articles, programs,

reviews, etc. We want this newsletter to help people use their computers

in ways that will be useful and fun.

[The following is reprinted from the Volume 1 number 1 issue of the

Amateur Computerist.]

Dawn of a New Era

From the Age of Darkness to the Age of Enlightenment – from the

Machine Age to the Mind Age, here we are. Let not any force or forces

keep it under wraps. Let it be free to circulate in the Public Domain. Let

us base it upon principle, not on price, like Truth or Love. From the

Great Wall to the Great Pyramid, from the hieroglyphics to the screen

of the computer, mankind is still progressing. So make the new born

science, that has given us the computer for the amateur and not as a

prerogative of the professional to be shrouded in secrecy from humanity,

the choice of the individual, not an election of a minority. From the

falling star to the falling apple, from the minute to the multitudinous,

from secrets to disclosure, I am pleased to endorse the amateur method.

Therefore I implore all to plan and to participate even though I have

been on disability for 26 years and have not had the opportunity to

participate in the great sea of knowledge that has flowed over the Dam

of Secrecy since I was inactivated physically and mentally – in my

advanced years and state of general debility I still see the mind of man

the greatest computer of all – So Let Us Continue to Make Use of It to

the Advantage of the Masses – Come, Let Us Reason Together. With an

open mind and a free spirit. Let me reiterate, there is so much more to

know, that what we do know, is still insignificant. It gives me great

pleasure to endorse this free-for-all program of a restless mind.

Page 27

Floyd Hoke-Miller, UAW Retiree and Flint Sit Down Striker (1895-

1990)

[The following is reprinted from the Volume 1 number 3 issue of the

Amateur Computerist.]

Computers and Free Speech

by Michael Hauben

Should there be unlimited freedom of speech? Should the Supreme

Court or any other federal court have the right to censor? Does

EVERYBODY have freedom of speech? These are some of the

questions based on freedom of speech. When Hitler came to power in

Germany, he limited freedom of speech by ending constitutional law.

When the Chairman of the opposing party made a passionate plea, Hitler

said, “Late you come, but still you come...during the time we were in the

opposition...in those days our press was forbidden and forbidden and

again forbidden, our meetings were forbidden and we were forbidden to

speak, and I was forbidden to speak, for years on end. And now you say:

criticism is salutary!”

For our society, freedom of speech is part of the Bill of Rights of

our Constitution. Many of the states that ratified the Constitution did so

with an understanding that a Bill of Rights restricting the power of the

federal government would be adopted. Patrick Henry was one of the

many to demand the Bill of Rights. He argued successfully for the Bill.

The different freedoms, including freedom of speech, protected by the

Bill of Rights have been and still will be defined through various cases

brought up in federal courts.

The concept of freedom of speech has a long history. It expanded

to speech on paper in the 15

Century when Johannes Gutenberg

invented moveable type in Europe. Books that were cheap and common

replaced the valuable, rare manuscripts immediately after the press was

introduced. Information could now be delivered to all who could read,

instead of only to those within earshot of a speaker. In England, the

Page 28

governing body thought the power of the printing press dangerous

enough to assign a censor. That censorship was shut down by Parliament

and then reinstalled after a flood of licentious and seditious literature

came out of the mighty presses. Many of these new uncensored books

were politically or theologically based.

John Milton, a 36 year old poet and a classical scholar of known

reputation, published on his own and without a license in the 17

Century, an answer to the Parliament’s censoring of printed materials.

He called it Areopagitica. In it he says “First, the decision of a censor

cannot be trusted unless the censor is infallible and beyond corruption.

No mortal possesses such grace; therefore no mortal is qualified to be a

censor. Second, since anything may tend to evil if misused, an effective

system of censorship will end up suppressing everything even music,

dancing, windows, balconies, eating, drinking, clothes and ‘the mixt

conversation of our youth, male and female together.’ Third, if a scheme

for issuing licenses be instituted, what does one do with books already

printed and in circulation? Fourth, the job of censor is so dull and

unsatisfactory that no able person will want it.”

In the five parts of Milton’s text, he talks about the types of people

for whom he is writing this book. The main type, the humanist, is

devoted to the debate and the discussion of things like freedom of

speech. He was the man of learning that Milton had in mind. Milton

knew that the person who talks about freedom of speech requires

freedom of speech.

Freedom of speech has been a topic widely debated around the

world on university campuses. For example, in 1964 on the Berkeley

Campus of the University of California, there developed the Free Speech

Movement which was a forerunner of the student-based civil rights and

anti-war movements that were active for the next ten years. From

Berkeley came several leaders for the up and coming computer

Homebrew movement which was the beginning of all personal comput-

ers we know today. In the last two years, there have been student revolts

against the political system in China and France.

Freedom of speech is still freedom of speech even for bad causes.

In North Carolina, and several other states, one can pay $5.00 for an

“open sesame” password onto the Aryan National Liberty Net, an

Page 29

electronic Bulletin Board. It contains the latest in neo-Nazi thought

offering sections entitled “Know your Enemies,” “ZOG Informers” and

“Patriotic Groups.” One of the main concerns is that of kids who like to

hack into closed computer bulletin boards. They are the most vulnerable

to this type of hate propaganda.

An important vehicle in the fight for free speech is the personal

computer. The personal computer can be a facilitator of free speech

because it is an information machine. It grew out of the supporters of the

anti-war movement who wanted a personal computer for the masses. At

the time, the computers available were the mainframes made by IBM

and other big manufacturers, affordable to only huge companies and the

government, and the mini-computers manufactured by DEC (Digital

Equipment Corporation) and others. The mini-computers were more of

a people computer because universities could afford them and make

them available to students.

Many clubs formed that had people interested in a people’s

computer. California’s Homebrew Club was one of the famous ones.

Many important founders of the personal computer blossomed in the

Homebrew Club. The first couple of real personal computers were made

exclusive, because the manufacturers wanted to make profit from them.

The hackers soon defeated the exclusive rights that these manufacturers

wanted. They figured out and standardized different aspects of the

machines to fit the hacker ethic, which stated everything should be in

public domain so that people could learn something from, be able to

benefit from, and finally be able to enhance it. As a result of these

pioneers, IBM was forced, when it entered the personal computer

market, to conform to the pioneers and to make an open, public machine.

IBM of all companies! IBM was the Godfather of the Mainframes.

These pioneers achieved a victory for free speech!

In 1987, on the campus of the University of Michigan (Ann Arbor),

free speech was again brought into question. On an electronic bulletin

board available to the University community, a file of ethnic, racial and

other jokes offensive to specific groups was made available by certain

students. The file kindled the fire of debate on freedom of speech and

computer propriety. After the student who started the file, was pressured

to close it, more debate flourished. Some students started files with

Page 30

page-long essays on the evils of bigotry, while others started new joke

files. So some students answered the discontinued joke file, while others

restarted it. Now that’s definitely freedom of speech!

Even more debates have been started about whether to limit what

people can say by computer, whether bad jokes should be allowed as a

category. “Some schools such as Dartmouth and Carnegie-Mellon have

imposed a code of ethics for students using their computers, with

violators facing removal from the system. Dartmouth specifically

prohibits offensive material in a code that warns: ‘Obscenities should

not be sent by computer nor stored where they could offend other

users’.”

Supporters of the joke file say that no one was forced to read

the file and that they had to go out of their way to read it. Isn’t there

always a temptation though? Robert Parnes, programmer of the software

used for the electronic bulletin board, said that he thought that the

students would try to test the bounds of decency.

Our world would have to be made better to have unlimited freedom

of speech. Most people in the world who have a type of Bill of Rights

have some protection of their freedom of speech. As Barbara Amiel

writes in her article “Censoring One, Censoring All,” “You either have

free speech for everybody or you do not have free speech,”

you have to

have unlimited freedom of speech or you are discriminating against a

viewpoint. The result of unlimited freedom of speech is that if someone

exercises their freedom and expresses their viewpoint on a matter, a

person of an opposing viewpoint would be able to answer the first

person’s work. This way everyone could hear all sides on that matter and

make up their own minds on what they agree with.

Notes

1. Barbara Amiel, Censoring One, Censoring All, MacLean’s, April 15, 1985, p 11.

2. Irving Younger, “What Good Is Freedom of Speech?,” Commentary, vol 79, Jan.

‘85, pp. 45-46.

3. Isabel Wilkerson, “Ethnic Jokes in Campus Prompt Debate,” New York Times, April

18, 1987.

4. Barbara Amiel.

Page 31

[The following is reprinted from the Volume 2 number 4 issue of the

Amateur Computerist.]

True Heros

by Michael Hauben

A hero is not someone who only appears a hero in our eyes, but one

who achieves good for the common man, against the will of the

establishment. This person must be able to stand up against the common

bad, instead of pleasing somebody. Often this person will either have all

or most of society going against him. The hero must be able to stand up

for what he believes in and not succumb to outside pressure.

Galileo is a good example of a hero. He challenged the Church by

publishing his scientific findings, which were against the then current

and less accurate Aristotelian science. He kept on studying and his mind

was unchanged even after the Inquisition challenged him. So in the end,

when the Inquisition tried to silence him by putting him under

house-arrest, he still got his writings out to the people. Galileo would not

be silenced by the Inquisition because in his search for the truth he was

not afraid to oppose authority!

Gary Kindall is another hero or at least part of a heroic movement.

He was the creator of CP/M (Control Program for Microprocessors), the

first operating system for micro-computers. CP/M was developed during

the beginning of the micro-computer revolution. Before micro-comput-

ers were developed, IBM (International Business Machines) and other

big companies produced the only computers available. The computers

that they marketed were incompatible mainframes and mini-computers

which only big businesses and big universities could afford. What the

micro-computer revolution brought together was a community of people

who wanted to bring the power of computers to the common people,

instead of just to these institutions. This community succeeded in

making the personal computer. They insisted that the personal computer

have an open architecture and be compatible. CP/M played a big part in

making the personal computers compatible. After a while, IBM wanted

to get into the micro-computer market, so they introduced a micro-

Page 32

computer that was incompatible with everything else. No one would

have anything to do with this machine, so IBM was forced to come out

with a more compatible and open machine! IBM went to Gary Kindall

and asked to use a version of CP/M for the IBM PC (Personal Com-

puter), but first they wanted him to sign a non-disclosure agreement. He

wouldn’t agree to IBM’s requirement of secrecy because that would be

breaking the micro-computer principle of keeping everything open and

available to all the people. So IBM didn’t use CP/M. Instead they used

something that was almost exactly like CP/M except it was developed

especially for IBM’s PC. Gary Kindall and the people who brought the

micro-computer into existence are heroes! They brought the secret of

computer power from IBM and other big companies to all the people!

Sports heroes and celebrities are not true heroes because they cannot

bring about real changes. People like Galileo and Kindall are real heroes

because they make a significant change in the world benefitting the

common person. All ages have untrue heroes, but true heroes are rare.

[The following is reprinted from the Volume 4 number 4 issue of the

Amateur Computerist.]

The Impact of the Computer

on Society: Two Views

The Future

Trond Andresen

[email protected]

If I should discuss “the future,” I would take, not a 10-20 year

perspective, but a 200 year perspective. I would ask myself: What is the

real LONG RANGE trend in the economy, and what sort of real LONG

RANGE target is made possible by that? Having decided on a 200 year

perspective, I would use that projection as a premise for the course I

would want society to follow in the more near future (0-10 years).

What then is the fundamental trend in the economy, seen from the

Page 33

perspective of 200 years? The answer is of course trivial: An immense

increase in productivity. And I will say: We have just seen the start of

this, what with automated manufacturing, process control, expert

systems, and in the not-so-near-future, Artificial Intelligence. I disagree

with environmentalists saying that increased productivity is impossible

because of environmental constraints. I agree with their mental alarm

about the constraints, but I think that automation, robots, and so on will

make us a better society for all, at the same time REDUCING the strain

on the environment.

Now comes the next point, which is not trivial at all: What sort of

society should we strive for in the light of the enormous technological

potential that a lot of us agree on?

Here is my scenario: A society where a small percentage of the

population oversees automatic processes in administration, manufactur-

ing and commerce. The industry will be running nearly without human

work-hours. So what do the other 95% do? Before I answer that

question, some thoughts about “the meaning of life.” Why do we need

industry? Is it an end in itself? (Listening to politicians and industrialists

in the media, one is led to believe that.)

In my view, industry is only a means TO GIVE PEOPLE MORE

TIME FOR WHAT THEY REALLY WOULD LIKE TO DO. The

remaining 95% of the workforce in my future society would have the

following jobs:

- Kindergarten teachers and nurses, 2 adults per 5 children.

- Teachers, in classes with less than 10 children in each class.

- Sailplane instructors, scuba-diving instructors, football trainers.

- Teaching kids mountain-climbing.

- Rearing horses.

- Drama instructors, singing instructors, actors, singers, musicians,

painters, etc.

- Health personnel, one doctor per 50 persons. Free hospitalization for

everybody.

- Researchers in anything from flowers to chess to astronomy to

historical masks of the South American Indians. A very big part of the

population in university-level education and research – ecologically

sound agriculture and animal husbandry, which, by the way, may be

Page 34

MORE labor-intensive than today’s industrialized attack on the

environment.

- Ecological managing and rebuilding of the world. Reforestation is one

important example.

OK, you can see where I’m going. And I would also stress:

Mandatory work-hours in this society are in the range of 2 - 4 hours, if

they are mandatory at all. But people will be on the job a lot more,

because they will LIKE what they are doing. No problem.

This far future scenario has the following consequences for shorter-

term policies:

- Automation is a good thing.

- Higher wages which lead to more automation is a good thing.

- Shorter work hours accompanied by job-sharing is a good thing.

- Less people in industry and more people in education/health

care/culture is a good thing.

- More people employed taking care of other people - and this cannot

and

should not be “automatized” – is a good thing.

In countries with publicly financed health care and education, like

my own country, this means the public sector taking a BIGGER piece

of the GNP. This, in my view, is a sign of an advanced society, and I

therefore find the persistent wailing from industry, finance and the

political right against growth in the public sector totally reactionary and

lacking any long term perspective.

[The following is reprinted from the Volume 3 number 1 issue of the

Amateur Computerist.]

The Spirit of Babbage

Chapter ONE

In the beginning The Spirit of Babbage created the software and the

hardware.

And hardware was expensive and low-tech; and incompatibleness was

on the face of the hardware.

Page 35

And The Spirit of Babbage said, Let there be a micro, and there were

micros.

And The Spirit of Babbage saw the micro, that it was good: and The

Spirit of Babbage divided the Micro from the Mainframe.

And The Spirit of Babbage called the micro Mark 8, and the Main-

frame he called the IBM.

And the evening and the morning were the 1

day.

And The Spirit of Babbage said, there be a firmament in the midst of

the common elements, and Let it divide the transistors from the ICs.

And The Spirit of Babbage made the firmament and divided the

common elements which were ICs from the common elements which

were transistors: And it was so.

And The Spirit of Babbage called the Firmament history. And the eve-

ning & the morning were the 2

day.

And The Spirit of Babbage said, Let the common elements from recent

history gather together unto one place and let the clubs appear: and it

was so.

And The Spirit of Babbage called the new clubs, homebrew clubs; and

the gathering together of the common elements Zilog: and The Spirit of

Babbage saw that it was good.

And The Spirit of Babbage said, Let the Hardware be programmed

after Jacquard’s kind: and it was so.

And the Hardware was programmed: and The Spirit of Babbage saw

that it was good.

And the evening and the morning were the 3

day.

And The Spirit of Babbage said, Let there be microcomputer compa-

nies to divide the 4 bit from the 8 bit microprocessor, the 8 bit from the

16 bit microprocessor, and the 16 bit from the 32 bit microprocessor.

And let them be for the existence of versatility in the world: and it was

so.

And The Spirit of Babbage made two great companies, the greater

company to dominate the business world, and the lesser company to rule

the graphics world: and The Spirit of Babbage made the competition too.

And The Spirit of Babbage set them in the Fortune 500 to make sure

they could be versatile: and The Spirit of Babbage saw it was good.

And the evening and the morning were the 4

day.

Page 36

And The Spirit of Babbage created the Altair, which stored data on

paper tape, And every Commodore Pet which stored data on cassette

tape after his kind: and The Spirit of Babbage saw that it was good.

And the evening and the morning were the 5

day.

And The Spirit of Babbage said, Let the Amateur Computer Clubs

bring forth the microcomputer, which stored data on disks, called Apple:

and it was so.

And The Spirit of Babbage said, Let us make IBM PCs in our own

image, after our likeness, and let them have dominion over the Altair

with paper tape storage, and over the Commodore Pet with cassette tape

storage, and over the Apple with disk storage.

So The Spirit of Babbage created the IBM PCs in his own image, in

the image of The Spirit of Babbage created he it; XT and AT created he

them.

And The Spirit of Babbage said, Behold I have given you every

programmer, who are in the clubs, and of every piece of software, who

wrote all of the pieces; to you it shall be meat.

And to all of the other computers with paper tape for storage, and to

every computer with cassette tapes for storage, and to every computer

with disk drives for storage, wherein they work, I have given all pieces

of software for meat: and it was so.

And The Spirit of Babbage saw everything that he had made, and,

behold, it was very good. And the evening & the morning were the 6

day.

Chapter TWO

Thus, the hardware and the software were finished, and all the host of

them.

And on the 7

day The Spirit of Babbage ended his work which he had

made; and he rested in the seventh day from all the work he had made.

But The Spirit of Babbage rested by playing computer games on all of

his creations.

And The Spirit of Babbage decided to bless this day by creating a

place for him to play computer games peacefully. And The Spirit of

Babbage said, Let there be a Charles Babbage Institute. And there the

Spirit of Babbage awaits.

Page 37

To be Continued...in the future.

Michael Hauben

Interview with Staff Member

Michael Hauben on the

Occasion of the 10

Anniversary of the Personal Computer

(Editor’s Note: This interview was conducted on August 11, 1991. It has

been edited.)

Ronda: Tomorrow is the 10

anniversary of the introduction of the

IBM personal computer on August 12, 1981. Also, one of our staff

members, Michael Hauben, is leaving Michigan to go to college in N.Y.

Therefore, it seemed an appropriate time to look back on the past 10

years and to review how the introduction of the personal computer has

affected our lives. Michael is now 18. In 1981 he was 8 years old and

already involved with computers. Michael is not only one of the

beneficiaries of the computer revolution. The computer revolution was

carried out, not so much by companies like IBM, but more importantly,

by computer hobbyists like Michael Hauben. Thus in honor of the

computer hobbyists, who gave birth to and developed the personal

computer, we would like to review some of your experiences, Michael,

with the computer.

William: How did you get started with computers?

Michael: The first place I really saw computers was at an exhibit in

Toronto over 10 years ago. There was a robot that was like the 4 axes

machine that auto workers use. They also had a computer exhibit. I don’t

remember what kind of computer was on display but they were just a

bunch of computers running different kinds of programs set up there at

the Canadian National Exhibit. That really peaked my interest somehow.

When I was 8 (in 1981), I took a computer class at Schoolcraft

Community College, in what was called the Kids College. It was part of

Page 38

what they called the TAG (Talented and Gifted) Program. The teacher’s

name was Mrs. Brown. We learned on the Apple II+’s. The first day of

class, Mrs. Brown lifted the top of the APPLE and said, “There, that’s

all there is to it, There’s nothing to be afraid of.” That was a very good

introduction to the computer because it showed there was nothing to be

afraid of. That we could completely control it. I learned BASIC there.

I took several other classes in that program. I think I took three. I didn’t

take all the BASIC language classes offered. But I took a test that they

had for their normal BASIC college level classes and I wound up getting

three college credits for the BASIC language class. And I didn’t do so

good because I ended up only getting a B on the test. But the experience

was interesting and from then on whenever there was a computer

available I tried to use it.

After the trip to Toronto, I always wanted to buy a computer. There

was the Texas Instruments 99/4a (TI 99/4a) and I don’t remember how

much it cost, but it was expensive. There was the Timex Sinclair 1000

(TS 1000) and that was much cheaper. My family and I had seen

Sinclair computers in England when we visited. These computers could

be hooked up to a normal t.v. set. I saved up my money and bought a

TS-1000. Using it I more thoroughly learned BASIC. My father and I

programmed a lot in BASIC with only 2K memory. We never seemed

to run out of memory. We just played around and tried to do lots of

different things, tried writing little games, graphics and we dabbled a

little in machine language, not a lot however. Whenever I had the

chance, whether it was summer camp or in a computer store, I’d try to

do something with the computer. I learned BASIC, I learned LOGO on

the TI-99/4a in Camp, and I played around with APPLES and with

Commodore PETS. In my elementary school, there was a terminal

hooked in with the mainframe of the Dearborn Schools. At that time

there were many programs on the mainframe. They had BASIC. They

had games like the OREGON TRAIL, etc. I subscribed to two or three

magazines for the TS-1000. I bought books, did all the TRY THIS type

of small programs. Those were always fun because there would always

be problems with the programs. There would always be bugs. The books

and sample programs were exciting somehow. I haven’t found many

books similar for programming on the IBM PCs today, books that I have

Page 39

found exciting for a hobbyist. And this is sad.

Soon after I bought the TS-1000, it couldn’t have been more than

a couple of years, I was trying to choose between the TS-2068 and the

Commodore 64. I think the Commodore was more expensive. The

TS-2068 had better color, and a more developed version of BASIC. The

Commodore 64 was better in that it had a disk drive and the TS-1000

only had a tape drive you could use. The Commodore also had a real

keyboard, while the Timex utilized raised chicklet keys. I bought the

TS-2068. Then I had my first real lesson in the computer world. Three

months after I bought the TS-2068, Timex stopped selling it and

supporting it. Timex made a deal with Commodore. There was an

agreement to sell the Sinclair in England and Europe and Commodore

in the United States. That was a shock because I thought I made a better

choice, but it turned out the better deal is not always the best choice.

And my father and I did programming on that, but not really as

much as we did on the TS-1000. It was a lot less, even though there was

the added attraction of the color and the sound and the joystick port. And

so I still did things and I tried to pick up on things whenever I could.

Christmas of 1984, we bought a Sanyo MBC-550-2 which was a

MS-DOS compatible, but not an IBM compatible, machine. The

operating system was IBM compatible, but the graphics were different,

the sound was different, and the BASIC was different. The Sanyo was

a better machine for graphics, I think 640 x 400 with 4 colors if not 16.

And WordStar worked. That’s why my family got it – as a

wordprocessor. I learned MS-Dos. I got more into the PC world. We

subscribed to a Sanyo magazine for a while. We went to the Sanyo

Users’ groups for a while. We occasionally went to SEMCO (Southeast

Michigan Computer Organization), but somehow that was already

oriented toward business and they weren’t very interested in helping us.

Then in 1985, through INACOMP, my mother won a Compaq Portable.

It was one of the earliest to come out that was fully IBM compatible. It

was a luggable portable, and it weighed about 20 pounds, if not more.

And that’s how I really got into IBM. We had a choice between a

modem and a hard drive. We got a modem. It was a breakthrough. The

hard drive seemed important but the modem was more important. We

wound up getting a hard drive later on. With the modem, it lets you

Page 40

connect to the outside world. With your own little system you’d be like

a hermit, but in connecting with the rest of the world, it’s other people’s

opinions, different discussions about computers, about current events,

debates about what’s going on in the world and just general BS also.

And you came into contact with people, you came into contact with

different files to use with your computer, with what was going on with

the computer scene and so somehow it was like a replacement for a user

group. And depending upon the time, there was either a lot going on or

a little going on.

Ronda: What do you mean?

Michael: Well right now not many boards I know have much debate

on them. There are two that I am on. Both of them have debates on-

going. I’m sure there are others, but I just haven’t had time to look. But

for a while I was on many of the boards and at one point many of the

boards were silly contests to see who could post the most numerous

messages.

Ronda: Do you have a sense what you were looking for on the

BBS’s? You used to spend a lot of time on them.

Michael: Well at first I wasn’t on local BBS’s. Originally, I was on

COMPUSERVE.

William: Free time?

Michael: Well, the first two hours were free. I almost became a

beta-tester for Infocom through COMPUSERVE. I sent in the applica-

tion forms. I then received a congratulations letter, but Infocom never

sent me any games to test. The only response was a Christmas card. That

was a soured Compuserve memory. I found some local BBS numbers

listed on Compuserve and from my father and some friends of his from

work. For a while I was mostly on Commodore BBS’s and not many

IBM boards. But then I started calling the IBM boards. It was new for

me when I started. Modeming was a connection to the outside world to

other people with similar interests. It was interesting – the debates about

current events. Somehow there was the possibility for intellectual

discussion which I couldn’t find elsewhere besides my parents and a few

friends like Floyd Hoke-Miller. But among my friends at school or

neighbors, there wasn’t much of a possibility.

When we lived in East Dearborn, our next door neighbor, Tom, had

Page 41

an Atari and a Commodore 64. He shared an interest in computers with

me. He was my friend, even though there was a large age gap, because

we were both interested in computers. He let me come over and try some

things on his computer and I’d go with him to computer stores.

William: Another thing about modems you can’t tell the age. Treats

you more like an equal.

Michael: There’s an anonymity. You don’t know anything about the

other users. So you are more willing to accept them. There are still first

impressions. If you act like a real idiot, people won’t like you. But the

full element of first impressions is left out. And people tend to rank you

or be friends with you on how you act on-line, what you speak about. It

does help. You tend to get to know the people and there isn’t as much

blocking. And my first handle was Wizkid. I changed my handle 2 or 3

years ago to Sentinel. And there was one person who signed on and said

it was great knowing you. He was one of the people who knew me as

Wizkid. There was a “Remembering the OLD Days” theme area on one

of the BBS’s and someone said, “remember that Wizkid.” And I said,

“that was me.” And he said he didn’t know that. When people change

their handles, it’s public but somehow people don’t always realize it.

When I changed my handle, I decreased my activity. When I decreased

my activity it was because there were just silly messages that didn’t

mean anything, or they just seemed juvenile, and I don’t know if that’s

because the people calling were younger or they were more juvenile.

The way people accept you is based on your maturity on-line and your

maturity showed through more than your age. And there was one debate

where someone said you are just a kid. And I used to have the handle

Wizkid. But it didn’t matter what your age was, it was more how mature

you were. He was trying to say “Well you’re just a kid, you can’t know

anything.” But he was wrong. So there is less age discrimination on the

boards.

Ronda: Why did you decrease the time you spent on the boards?

Michael: I had to spend more time with school, with friends, with

my job. Whenever I used to come home from school, I used to spend 2

or 3 hours, but then my mom said, “We need the phone.” So I didn’t

spend my free time before homework on the modem. And then with

work, I wasn’t even home on certain days to use the modem.

Page 42

Ronda: But it seemed you were also a little disappointed. There

were user parties, but it seemed the computer world didn’t extend

outside of the modem.

Michael: It did to a certain extent, but it didn’t include everyone.

Like some people were friends before. There were modem parties where

people from the boards got together, whether it was a software swap or

a party.

Ronda: There weren’t many, were there?

Michael: Well, what happened was the main person who had the

parties was from a TAG board in Taylor. He had his computer stolen

after the 2nd or 3rd party. So he stopped holding them. Then there were

multiuser boards. There was M-Net which was a multi-user. The general

ages of the users on M-Net was older than on the other single-user

BBS’s. And it was more serious. It was more a UNIX board. It was a

different bunch. It was not the home but the people in school, in Ann

Arbor. It seemed like the multi-user boards made it easier to hold parties

because users could chat live one-on-one. And when AMUSERS (a

multi-user board) closed down, I didn’t get on other multi-users that

were like AMUSERS. Some people already were friends but you didn’t

end up doing much so it was a little disappointing. Cause it didn’t seem

like there was any – it didn’t get anywhere – it was just on-line so that

was a little disconcerting. It was disappointing because that was where

I had found more intellectual people but it didn’t go anywhere. And

things like COMPUSERVE cost a lot of money. There’s COMPU-

SERVE, there’s Delphi, there’s Geni, there’s PC Link, there’s Q-link,

there’s a couple of services but they all cost money, so that’s hard to

deal with. And then there are bigger boards that exist. But they all cost

money. There’s the WELL. That’s in California. You also pay per hour

like Compuserve. So it’s harder to be on. It’s like M-Net. It’s the same

software as M-Net. And maybe I did find it disappointing. It used to be

there would be lots of new BBS’s popping up. But they were interesting.

And now there still are lots of new BBS’s popping up. But they’re silly.

So it’s gone downhill a little bit. And also BBS’s are similar to the CB

or the Ham radio in that people voice their opinions, or have discussions

or chat or there used to be DDial’s – all they were were multi-user,

people chatting, but they were 300 baud so they were super slow. Some

Page 43

of those you had to acquire membership. But they were linked up across

the country. There were things called LINKS that would connect you to

other DDial’s around the country. So that way you could talk to people.

Somehow the thing about BBS’s was it was the ultimate vehicle of

Free Speech, uncensored speech. For the most part things were not

censored. What you posted was left alone. It was like everyone’s Letter

to the Editor was allowed to be printed. There would be letters debating

other previous letters. Different SysOps had different rules and some

would delete messages that contained profanity or were only personal

attacks or something. BBS’s are the greatest form of free speech. The

problem was you needed a modem and a computer to get into it. So it’s

not as free as it might be, but compared to the newspapers, the newspa-

pers print what they choose, whereas on BBS’s everything is printed,

everything is published. It’s more of a dynamic medium than a static

medium because depending on the board there’s different forms of

dealing with messages. For example, some boards after the first 50

messages go by, the first message is deleted, so it’s a dynamic thing.

Unless somebody prints out a copy or saves it to disk, it doesn’t stay

static. Like on M-Net, things aren’t deleted. They are deleted when the

message SysOp of the area decides no one is interested anymore. That’s

more of a choice method of deletion, than where it deletes messages or

the new one pops in, the old one pops out and it’s deleted. And even

depending on what happens, it’s still an important medium.

There was, for example, just a debate about the war against IRAQ

on BBS’s. Usually you didn’t see where there was dissent. Whereas on

the computer, if people wanted to, they could debate it and there was

debate about it. A free medium. It’s open access. Not closed. It’s also a

field where the hobbyist still exists. There are people who develop ways

of using the modem, whether it’s different compression techniques

where you can send more and larger files quicker, or whether it’s

different file protocols that send them faster over phone lines. Those are

constantly developing. That is a hobbyist frontier now. Maybe there are

less people than when the computer started out. But it still exists. It’s a

frontier that’s not closed up yet. It’s not definite yet. New things are

continuing to come out. For example, higher speed chips for the serial

ports in the computer so that the computer can talk to the modem at a

Page 44

higher speed and everything.

Part II

Ronda: Do you think there are any lessons from what is going on?

Michael: Well, the Timex/Sinclair Commodore agreement was

proof that the best choice is not always for the best. The best product

does not always end up being marketed or sold. That seems true of many

things in this capitalist world. Sony’s Beta video system was technologi-

cally superior to the current VHS standard. I don’t know if there is a

lesson to draw or not. A similar problem is occurring with computer

magazines. In particular I am thinking of: Popular Computing, Family

Computing, PC Computing, Creative Computing, and Compute. Most of

the magazines have changed their priorities from an emphasis on

hobbyist or home users to business. Popular Computing disappeared

shortly after changing its name to Business Computing. The same thing

happened with Family Computing after it changed its name and

emphasis to Home and Office Computing. Unfortunately PC Computing

is following the same path. PC Computing started out as an alternative

to other magazines such as PC Magazine and PC for the home or

hobbyist crowd in the PC community. It had reviews of games and

broader articles, while being a smidgen less technical and completely

unconnected to a business point of view. The subtitle is now “The

magazine for Business Computing Experts.” Readers have recognized

the change and written letters to the editor to comment and complain. As

for other examples, Creative Computing vanished and Compute

compressed down to one magazine from what was four. However,

Commodore 64s still sell, and that is a viable community. I guess PCs

are coming home from the office, but that doesn’t mean they are only

used for business at home. A whole community seems to be left un-

serviced by this trend in computer magazines. True, computer gaming

magazines exist, but home computers are used for much more than just

playing games. One problem is that PCs are not particularly getting

cheaper. Any decrease in price has more or less been incidental to the

increase in power. The 386s (Intel 80386) cost today what the 286 (Intel

80286) cost yesterday. But there are still no really affordable computers

in the $100 to $200 range. This is sad, because the computer is not as

affordable as it should be. Thus, personal computers are still not a

Page 45

normal part of most households which was the real goal of the personal

computer revolution. While most homes have been affected by the

arrival of microprocessors in many home appliances, the Personal

Computer itself is not yet a home appliance. The general recent trend of

computer development is aimed at business, as opposed to the people.

Not for the majority, but for the minority. It’s like what IBM did for the

mainframe and other mainframe manufacturers in the ‘50s, ‘60s and

‘70s. The mainframe then was only affordable by the biggest of the big

companies or the large educational institution. The difference today is

that small business can afford computers, but still only businesses.

Computers are marketed as for businesses and entrepreneurs, and not for

the average person at home, or for the majority of the people. The

radical push of the personal computer movement in the mid to late ‘70s

was to make the computer available to everyone, and not just accessible

to Fortune 500 companies. True, these days computers are much more

affordable than 20 years ago, but the general movement in the personal

computer world seems opposed to its roots.

Ronda: How so?

Michael: IBM exemplifies this movement with the release of their

PS/2 line. These computers have a proprietary bus. IBM changed the

name away from Personal Computer to Personal System/2 which is

more like the main-frame names. It made it less friendly in that sense.

Ronda: Are you optimistic? Pessimistic? What do you think will be

the future with computers? With you and computers?

Michael: Well by going away to school I’ll gain more access to

what’s called the Internet, the big net that exists, the connection of

computers across this country and across the world. You gain more

access when you go into an educational community. I’m optimistic

because of that. I’ll have to manage that as part of my time. Businesses

and education are involved in that. It’s harder if you live at home to have

access to it. (Editor’s Note: Home access is more available now, than it

was a year ago when this interview was done.) Somehow you need

something powerful enough to hook into. It’s not quite fully open. If you

live near an educational community you can gain access to it. I have and

you can. Our connection is MichNet. So that will be broadening. That

will be a connection with the rest of the world computerwise, but it’s not

Page 46

quite just the computer. So that’s encouraging.

Somehow they are working on building things smaller and more

minuscule but not quite pricewise. The computers aren’t quite like the

microwave and the VCR. Home appliances started out expensive but

there are now so many different companies making them that they have

come down in price so they are affordable. As I said before computer

performance increased but it doesn’t come down in price. Actually, it’s

going to be a stretch to buy a computer for myself, but I wouldn’t have

been able to buy one last year. What used to be $2000 is now $1000 or

coming closer to $1000.

Ronda: Do you think there has been some kind of revolution with

computers? Do you think there has been a computer revolution?

Michael: Well, there is the personal computer. If it was up to the big

companies, there wouldn’t have been one. As I said the corporate trend

is reactionary.

Ronda: Do you think there’s been a computer revolution, William?

William: What do you mean by a computer revolution?

Ronda: That something fundamental has changed because of the

computer.

William: Fundamental?

Ronda: Or something substantial that you see at work?

William: We’re using computers more. We’ve got IBM 486

computers on the shop floor.

Michael: But what do you use them for?

William: For altering and transferring programs to our CNC

machining center. We got rid of the Westinghouse computer in the

computer room and you can download more files into the 486 computer.

It has all our files already. It won’t hold us up when we are running the

machine.

Ronda: But the computer isn’t being used to run a machine?

William: No it’s not to run a machine directly. You have other

computers for that.

Michael: So the computers are like terminals?

William: It’s like a database. But you can edit and change the data

if you need to.

Ronda: Are most people comfortable with them. Or is it that if

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people don’t have home computers it’s harder to use them?

William: Well they have menus instead of working with DOS. It

just takes a F[unction] key and that is it. We finally got a manual for it.

The editor is difficult to work with. They’re still working on a new

editor....

Ronda: Remember they were talking about the workerless factory

in the last 7 or 8 years. My sense is that hasn’t come to pass.

William: Well, there are a lot less people working in my shop.

They’re standardizing everything so there’s less skill involved in putting

dies together.

Ronda: But the computer hasn’t cut the people out or caused

problems?

William: No.

Ronda: So do you think there’s been some kind of computer

revolution in the last 10 or 15 years? That something substantial has

happened to change....

William: Society?

Michael: Well a lot of things have computer chips in them now. All

your household appliances have them from the TV set on.

William: Cars have them.

Michael: Cars have them now so society has been changed by the

introduction of them. The mainframe computer didn’t use processing

chips. It took buildings with several floors to house those computers. But

now, the personal computer is the achievement of the trend of miniatur-

ization that came in the 1950s.

William: More like evolution, right. You got chips in TV’s now.

You got picture-in-picture, not revolution, not a substantial change.

Michael: Well, there was the miniaturization after WWII but it

didn’t hit computers then. Computers were still the great big mainframes

that used the vacuum tubes. Then came the transistor, the microproces-

sor, and the integrated circuit. But they weren’t really utilized with the

mainframes. Or if they were, instead of a whole floor, it was a room. But

it wasn’t down to a single chip which now exists and which is constantly

getting smaller. They think they’re reaching the bounds actually. Now

people are speculating that the silicon chip has reached its physical

speed and size limits and a new material needs to be used, like chemical

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or biological materials instead of electronic. But I feel if it had not been

for the personal computer revolution, there wouldn’t be such use of

processing chips and use of computing technology involved in so many

things in our daily lives.

Ronda: But I feel the substantial question is are they being used to

produce more with less labor? I think they are being used more as

consumer goods. But it doesn’t sound like there has been a change, a

fundamental change in the way things are produced. For example, at the

beginning of the Industrial Revolution, people worked in their homes.

Then people were brought into the factories to work together. There was

an increasing division of labor, and then machines were introduced and

people operated the machines. Then machines were used to operate other

machines.

It doesn’t seem as if the computer has led to a similar kind of

change in industrial production. It doesn’t seem that computers are

widely used to produce things. It seems the computer has been used for

paperwork but not for producing goods.

William: It takes longer to get a computer to do something than it

does a machine. They are probably working on that stuff too.

Michael: But actually there’s something called CAD/CAM or

Computer Aided Design and Manufacturing. But then there’s something

called CIM which I did study and it seemed like it was trying to steal the

computer and give it to management which was a top down design and

not a bottom up design. When I read about it two years ago it seemed a

flop. It was trying to steal the computers from the people rather than

using the computers to help the manufacturing process. But I don’t know

what your experience has been with CIM.

Ronda: But there was also a big push to lower wages and have

people work a lot of overtime. And I thought that got in the way of using

the computer to make production more efficient.

William: You also had international competition too. Third world

countries have cheaper labor. So we had to compete with them. So that’s

one reason why the lower wages.

Ronda: But you can never compete with the cheapest country, and

in fact the story of production is that the higher the wages, the more

advanced the technology, the less labor that goes into producing

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something, the cheaper it can be sold for. Somehow the whole stress of

trying to make U.S. workers compete with workers in less industrialized

countries is a backwards trend. The price of things is very high because

hand labor is very expensive. So in this country we had the ability to

make production more efficient, that’s the story of how cars have gotten

cheaper, how microwaves have gotten cheaper, how air conditioners

have gotten cheaper because there were more advanced technologies,

not because you found someone abroad to work for cheaper wages. With

cheaper wages and backward production methods, the price of goods

stays high. There is a need for more public discussion over how

computers can be used to change industrial production. There was a

fight with the corporate world over what would happen with computers

and people had to challenge the corporate barrage demanding wage cuts

and longer hours which impede automation. There are examples of

countries where advanced technology that was available was never used

in production because workers’ wages were so low or their hours so long

that it was not cost efficient to put in the new machine. So that country

remained technologically backward. The story of the development of

technology is that the more advanced technology somewhere replaces

the lower wage backward technology somewhere else, not that goods

made by low wage workers replace goods made with less human labor

and operating more efficient machines. But workers have to organize to

prevent the wage cuts and increased hours that impede the introduction

of new technology. Somehow the corporate attack on workers and

unions has led to people looking backward, not keeping our eye on how

to go forward.

Ronda: Any final words?

Michael: Even though I have decided to go to Columbia University

in NYC instead of the University of Michigan, I am optimistic.

Columbia is less computer-oriented than the University of Michigan, but

Columbia seems better connected to the educational and academic

computer networks. But Michigan for me would have been a better

computer school. Columbia has more of its computer roots in the past

while Michigan has more in the future. There are a couple of centers

opening up and there is, at Columbia, the State Center for Computing

Research. But it’s not as obvious as Michigan how involved Columbia

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is with computers. I am sort of pessimistic, because with the age of the

computer industry, it seems to have receded. But it’s probably just a

cycle.

Ronda: No, it’s a fight. You have to figure out how to take it up.

The personal computer caught people by surprise when it spread so

quickly and so substantially. People now have to evaluate what has

happened. I feel the lesson is you can’t trust the business world of large

corporations to develop computers and computer technology. Big

corporations can’t be coddled by government, the press, etc. and

encouraged to freeze the development of technology or to go backwards

to hand labor as they have done in many instances. The machine is a

machine for society. It was a mistake to have trusted that the corporate

world would develop it. Instead the corporate world must be regulated

and limited in its efforts to impede the development of technology.

That’s what antitrust legislation originally accomplished. The personal

computer was created while there was a U.S. govt. anti trust suit on

against IBM which kept it from interfering with the development of the

personal computer. Once again there is a need for something independ-

ent of the corporate world, and there is a need for regulations and

limitations on the corporate world so that their narrow self interest is

prevented from interfering with social and technological development.

Michael: You need a new Henry Ford for the Computer world.

Ronda: No, you need another Computers for the People movement.

Michael: No, again.

William: My niece is going to go to Michigan State and she’s not

going to get a computer. She’s going to get a word processor. You have

a screen, keyboard, and a printer all in one unit. That suits her.

Michael: But it’s not compatible with anything other than another

wordprocessor of the same type.

William: There are some that have a floppy disk.

Ronda: But it’s sad the computers aren’t cheap with a cheaper

printer too.

William: Well it’s a letter-quality printer, she’s not going to be

doing graphics.

Ronda: I thought John Kemeny once predicted that there would be

computers used in the schools for wondrous things. But now he is

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disappointed that that has not happened.

William: One of the problems is software. There aren’t enough

software developers to write programs people need. To get them

involved.

Michael: It’s not just software developers, it’s ideas. People are not

creating new ideas but merely copying old ideas.

Ronda: But I thought that there was the discouragement, when

people were told “People don’t need to learn to program.” Michael

learned to program and it was a good thing he learned to program.

Instead of saying it’s a good thing to learn a little programming it was

said you don’t need programming. So it seems that there has been a lot

of pressure to keep people away from utilizing computers and discourag-

ing them instead.

Michael: I left out that I know a little MS-DOS batch language, a

little C, and a little Forth. I did very little in Assembler.

William: Are you going to take computer classes in collage.

Michael: I don’t know if I’ll have time.

Ronda: To sum up, it seems it is as if this period is like the period

in France before the French Revolution. Then there was the basis to have

capitalism, but you had the feudal lords and the King holding society

back. You had a Monarchy. There was a need for the French Revolution

to get rid of the Monarchy and the Aristocracy and the feudal social

forms and laws that they kept in place. They prevented the reforms that

were needed to develop large scale production in France. The problem

we have today seems similar. Big companies are discouraging invest-

ment in new technology like computers because such investment will

lower their rate of profit. There is a need to get rid of this fetter so that

technology can be encouraged and developed. In France, in 1789, it took

a revolution to get rid of a similar fetter. What will it take now?

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Amateur Computerist Staff in 1998

Amateur Computerist Staff in 2003

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EDITORIAL STAFF

Ronda Hauben

William Rohler

Norman O. Thompson

Michael Hauben (1973-2001)

Jay Hauben

The Amateur Computerist invites submissions. Articles can be

submitted via e-mail:

[email protected] Permission is given to reprint articles from

this issue in a non profit publication provided credit is given, with name of

author and source of article cited.

The opinions expressed in articles are those of their authors and not

necessarily the opinions of the Amateur Computerist newsletter. We

welcome submissions from a spectrum of viewpoints.

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